ABSTRACT
September 11 attack was meticulously planned and executed by the al-Qaeda. It was originally aimed to shake three important pillars of American State – World Trade Centre, Pentagon and the White House. After the incident, there was overwhelming support for the United States (US) and condemnations for the terror incident worldwide. US did not take much time to determine that Afghanistan based al-Qaeda, headed by Osama bin Laden, was behind the attack and decided to build an international coalition to ght against terrorism which was later known as the ‘coalition of willing’. This very attack on the sole superpower guided a structural change in the international system and subsequently US launched its ‘Global War on Terrorism’ (GWOT) to eliminate the top al-Qaeda leadership responsible for the event and dismantle the infrastructure of terror worldwide. In the history of international relations, it was the rst war of its kind which was declared against a non-state actor – the al-Qaeda and its aliates. Under severe international pressure and amidst fears of being declared a terrorist state, Pakistan entered into counterterrorism cooperation with the US and made a swift decision to ocially abandon its longtime ally the Taliban through which it was trying to secure ‘strategic depth’ against its arch-rival India.
